Email on voting prompts questions about Perry prayer event

Prayer event email prompts new questionsDoes message infer political help for Perry?

PEGGY FIKAC, AUSTIN BUREAU

Published
5:30 am CDT, Friday, August 19, 2011

AUSTIN — The organizer of The Response, the massive Aug. 6 prayer rally initiated by Gov. Rick Perry, is calling on attendees to help register millions of conservative Christians, prompting questions about the group and Perry's claims the event was not political.

Don Wildmon, founder of the American Family Association, sent an email Thursday thanking recipients for registering for The Response, which drew thousands of people to Reliant Stadium.

"Today, I want to introduce you to Champion the Vote (CTV), a friend of AFA whose mission is to mobilize 5 million unregistered conservative Christians to register and vote according to the Biblical worldview in 2012," Wildmon wrote.

The email does not mention any candidate or party, and experts said it appears to keep on the right side of the law governing nonprofits.

Mark Jones, political science professor at Rice University, said tax-exempt nonprofits can engage in voter registration, education and turnout drives. He added of the email, however, "It certainly highlights the political nature of The Response."

Denies link to politics

Perry's office and political advisers have insisted The Response was not a political event.

Perry launched a bid for the Republican nomination for president last week and is counting on a base of support among conservative Christians who play a key role in early voting states.

Eric Bearse, who was spokesman for The Response, stood by the idea that it was not a political event.

"The Perry campaign hasn't used any of the data from the event for any type of political purpose," said Bearse, who now is with the Perry campaign but said he was not responding on its behalf. "The AFA sending out an email to register people - if that is political, then I guess so is the activity of the secretary of states' offices in all 50 states."

A secretary of state's office, however, is unlikely to say, as Wildmon did, "The Response was just the beginning of a nationwide initiative to return America to the principles on which she was founded, with God at the center of our nation."

The duh factor

Annie Laurie Gaylor, of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said she planned to check with a staff lawyer regarding the email. The foundation unsuccessfully sued to stop Perry from participating in or promoting The Response in his role as governor.

"Come on, how dumb do they think we are?," she said. "He's running for president. Who do they want them to vote for?"

"I'm most troubled that the claims made by Gov. Perry and Response supporters that The Response was only about prayer and fasting seem to have been only part of the story. I think The Response was sponsored by a current presidential candidate, and those folks were exposed to the early campaign propaganda for that candidate, and now they're being asked to register their friends and themselves to vote. It seems to suggest that The Response was as much about launching Gov. Perry's presidential campaign as anything else."

Neither the American Family Association nor Champion the Vote returned telephone calls for comment. A Perry representative did not return an e-mail and telephone call seeking comment.